Waterbury evening Democrat., 1887-12-30
YOUNG SUFFERERS.

YOUNG SUFFERERS.
 TO PREVENT OR CURE DEFECTIVE.
 DIFFERENCES IN CHILDREN.
 Sensible Advice from a Competent Au-
 thority-Importance of Early Correc-
 t1on = Proper Respiration - Value of
 Towels and Consonants.
 It is altogether useless nay, even in high degree injurious, to scold or, worse still, strike a child for a defective utterance or stutterlng. It IS requisite that those who surround such child should be most gentle and calm, for everything harsh or abrupt startles, and nothing is more adapted to pro mote stuttering than terror and fear.
 With grown up persons with children between and 12 years explanations or prescribed rules may exercise beneficial effect; with children below years this is altogether useless. Here only the means that nature prescribes can be applied-that is imitation and habit. Whatever child of such tender age sees or hears it initiates, and very often with surprising fidelity. Hence the creation of a d-alect which is J The persons surrounding the child are every thing in it's development, and it depends principally on them how it's natural abilities are developed and what defects make their appearance. Persons in contact with child of this age ought not to have defects of any kind, as, for instance, in breathing, in the production of voice, in speaking and in lan- guage. They ought not to speak too rapidly, too hastily or ill detached phrases the child, forced by nature to rely on imitation, will assume all these defects. Hence let the fam fly be very careful that the child hears only good speaking.
 As soon as a mother perceives that child has the habit of repeating, and quickly re- beating, syllables or letters, or, indeed, of in- correctly pronouncing words or syllables or letters, she must not let this pass by un- noticed, or even, perhaps, laugh at the mat ter in amusement, mimicking the incorrectly spoken words and exaggerating the defects; but she must with the greatest calmness, and without startling the child by too sudden in terruption, slowly and distinctly utter in cor rect manner the wrongly pronounced word, syllable or letter and cause the little one to repeat it in like manner. Let the mother, however, be careful not to do this with a forced distinctness of utterance, for, as the child will initiate her, it will now fall into the error of affectation, which will increase just as much as any other defect. If the mother has failed to understand the child, let her cause it slowly co repeat it's words, al ways, however, without startling it by too sudden or violent commands, and let her make it a rule never to comply with the wish of a child which it has not clearly and dis tinctly uttered. A story is told of mother who cured her child of stuttering by forcing 1t to pronounce everything in a long drawn, almost singing, manner. For instance: "Pl-ea-se lee mo have an apple" Not until the child had thus spoken was it's wish complied with. Such positive determination is absolutely indispensable to mothers and teachers.
 Though, as I have already said, rules and laws are of no avail in the case of a child of from to or years, yet it must be accus- toned to certain fixed manner of utterance. Above all, it must be accustomed always to take breath before beginning to speak, whereby it gains air, time and tranquility to speak When person wishes to speak he must first take breath. This the child usu- ally fails to do; it begins with half filled, sometimes with nearly empty lungs, to ex- press it's thoughts, and hence, of course, is forced after one or two words to take breath convulsively in order to continue to speak for instance: eff you Ia pant for -air) want to go there, etc." This injurious manner of respi- ration is very prevalent among vivacious children of from 3 to 5 years. If this defect of speech be not broken, many defects, prin- cipally among them stuttering, will ensue in time. Itis, therefore, just at this age that a child requires to be treated with the greatest attention, love and patience, and must not be left to itself in tho development of its speech
 A very good means of training a child to speak properly, as indeed to concentrate it's wandering thoughts, is to tell it stories. Let the mother relate little stories to the child, using only easily understood words, short sentences, which can be comprehended by the child, and let her, ere coming to the end of the tale, cause the child to repeat part after part slowly and distinctly, being careful to notice every mistake of the child in breath ing and speaking, as well as in the language itself, and to correct every phonetic defect in a pleasant and gentle manner, not allowing the slightest mistake to pass unnoticed. In this manner, relating and being related to, let the story be brought to close.
 If it is particularly difficult for the child to utterly correctly certain worlds syllables or letters, let the mother repeat these slowly,
 oudly and distinctly (though not in forced maanerl until the child can pronounce them correctly. Let the mother be careful that the vowels are always pronounced clearly that is, with the correct vowel shades and with the necessary duration-and the con- sonant sounds are made short but decided The letters of the alphabet (vowels and con- sonants require a certain time for their formation and must have certain duration in speech. The vowel is the carrier of sound <; on it we must tarry when it becomes neces- sary; upon it we must put every degree of emphasis, every shade of accent, for it is the expression of our feeling, It is the body of the language. The consonant is only the dress Both must be rightly produced in or der to obtain the right results, and, as a beautiful body in an ugly dress loses much of it's beauty, aye, is often disfigured, so it is with a syllable or word the vowels of which are falsely or effectively created. The great est faults in speaking are too great an ex- penditure of strength and too long dura- tion of time in the creation of the con- sonants, and too short duration of time, lacl, of strength and neglect to give the vowel shades in the creation of the vowels
 It is very injurious to a child inclined to stutter if it's questions-aand it puts many are either not answered at all or very impa- tiently. The child finally becomes imbued with a sort of reluctance to put any ques- tions, withdraws into itself and forgets to %Jvr{ {<>c o11